What To Do In An Active Shooter Situation? Part 5

As in the previous blogs, unless I quote someone else, these are my opinions and I am not speaking for any organization, including those that I am employed by or a member of.

This blog is all about the mindset and training needed to kill someone who is intent on causing great bodily harm to you, your friends and loved ones, or even your co-workers, before they kill you. This is the mentality of a sheep dog.

Before I go too much further, you need to know that not everyone can or should be a sheepdog. If you do not have the mindset to be a sheepdog, then you can be a sheep and that’s okay. Just don’t be horrified because the sheepdog next to you is carrying a concealed weapon so that he or she is ready when the wolf comes.

Peace officers are sheepdogs. They have made a conscious decision to walk into toxic environments so that others don’t need to. But wolves can be anywhere and you can’t always have a peace officer by your side.

But there are substantially more retired peace officers than there are active peace officers, and if certain training, qualification, and other requirements are met, they are allowed to carry concealed weapons. In fact, I will bet that most of them carry all the time, even when they are in a church or temple.

How many retired peace officers are working at your organization, but cannot carry due to company policy? Is there a specific reason for that policy or is it because a sheep in the executive staff is afraid of guns? These people have the mindset and the training to be sheepdogs and you should offer them every opportunity to protect their coworkers by allowing them to carry while at work.

If you are not a peace officer but think that you are a sheepdog, you need to be trained. Even if you can get a concealed carry permit without extensive training, you shouldn’t actually carry a weapon until you are completely comfortable that you can care for it and use it — and even then, only when absolutely necessary.

There are many facilities that can give you basic training, but before carrying a weapon, I strongly recommend a 20-40 hour tactical class divided between classroom and range time with at least 1000 rounds going downrange. Jackson Arms in the San Francisco bay area, Front Sight in Nevada, and Gunsite Academy in Arizona are just a few of the facilities available to you.

To be a sheepdog, you must be physically and mentally prepared, appropriately trained, and you must always carry your gun with you. I say always, because that one time that you decide to leave your gun locked in the safe is the one time that you are going to need it.

Guns are not for everyone, but if someone wants to be a sheepdog, it’s going to be hard for you to stop them. No matter what the media says, guns are not dangerous when properly handled by a trained individual. Which means that if you are not trained or you don’t have a training class scheduled, you shouldn’t own one.

Since 9/11, more of us have become sheepdogs, which is one reason that air travel has stayed safe. No longer will we sit in our seats like sheep when we see that our fellow passengers could be in danger. And this is a good thing, because the wolves will always be out there.

I want to hear your thoughts so please feel free to share this blog with your friends and send comments to me.

Two events occurred in the same week, which have hardened my resolve in this area. One of course was the tragic shooting in Aurora, but another involved a friend of a friend (FOF), in Taos, NM.

In the later case, someone knocked on the door of the FOF’s house around 6 in the morning. The FOF’s roommate let him in, whereupon he put the FOF in a headlock and started beating him with a pistol until he came up with cash and some $150 of ostensibly legal medical marijuana. The assailant then left, and my friend’s friend called 911 to report the incident. Just after he hung up, the assailant returned, and finding the door locked, tried to crawl in through the doggy door, pistol in hand. At that point the FOF grabbed his AK-47 and put six or seven shots through the steel door, wounding the assailant in the leg. He was transported to the Intensive Care Unit at Christus St. Vincent’s hospital in Santa Fe, where he was kept under close surveillance just two rooms down from where my wife was recovering from carotid artery surgery!

In Ron’s blogs, he divides the world into three classes of people: innocent sheep, murdering wolves, and sheep dogs who try to protect the sheep. The sheep dogs include present and past law enforcement officers, the military, and trained civilians who may be authorized to carry concealed weapons, and are willing and able to protect themselves and others. Having had over 40 hours of intensive training, extensive range experience, and a concealed carry permit in three different states, I consider myself a sheepdog, albeit one who is now a little more arthritic and whose teeth may not be quite as sharp as they used to be. But had I been armed in the theater in Aurora, I would have done my very best to take out the shooter, or die trying, just as three or four valiant victims lost their lives or were seriously wounded trying to protect their girlfriends or family members.

The NRA’s slogan, “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people” is often derided, but it is still true. And with approximately 250 million guns in this country, trying to get rid of every gun would not only be impossible, but would surely spark an armed rebellion. But even if someone could wave a magic wand and make all of the guns disappear, would that prevent a madman from trying to kill someone some other way? It didn’t stop someone in Japan from launching a Sarin gas attack on a subway, or the killer in virtually gun-free Norway from killing 77 children, or an Al Qaeda suicide bomber from blowing up a shopping center.

So here’s another slogan to consider, “Signs don’t stop wolves, sheepdogs stop wolves.” Laws and unenforced gun-free zones don’t stop those who are intent on killing, but they may prevent others from putting down a killer.

In other words, putting up a sign that says that this theater, hospital, bar, school, or church is a gun-free zone, and that anyone who is carrying a gun on those premises is guilty of a felony, does absolutely nothing to dissuade someone who is intent on carrying out a much worse felony. But it does dissuade people like myself from going to that theater, etc., ever again, since it means giving up my right to defend my loved ones and myself, or risk being convicted of a felony.

And to post such signs and then leave the back door unlocked and without an alarm would seem to be the height of stupidity, and I hope and pray that the theater owners will be successfully sued by all of the victims and their families.

I fully intend to keep on carrying my Kimber .45 as long as I’m physically able, I now carry two additional clips for backup, and I’m distributing my other guns discretely throughout the house, instead of keeping them locked up. (Needless to say, I don’t have any children in the house, nor anyone I don’t trust, or I wouldn’t do that.)